State Shintō (国家神道 or 國家神道, Kokka Shintō) was Imperial Japan's ideological use of the Japanese folk religion and traditions of Shinto.^: 547 The state exercised control of shrine finances and training regimes for priests^{: 59 : 120} to strongly encourage Shinto practices that emphasized the Emperor as a divine being.^: 8

The State Shinto ideology emerged at the start of the Meiji era, after government officials defined freedom of religion within the Meiji Constitution.^: 115 Imperial scholars believed Shinto reflected the historical fact of the Emperor's divine origins rather than a religious belief, and argued that it should enjoy a privileged relationship with the Japanese state.^{: 8 : 59} The government argued that Shinto was a non-religious moral tradition and patriotic practice, to give the impression that they supported religious freedom.^{: 59 : 120} Though early Meiji-era attempts to unite Shinto and the state failed,^: 51 this non-religious concept of ideological Shinto was incorporated into state bureaucracy.^: 547 Shrines were defined as patriotic, not religious, institutions, which served state purposes such as honoring the war dead;^: 91 this is known as Secular Shrine Theory.

The state also integrated local shrines into political functions, occasionally spurring local opposition and resentment.^: 120 With fewer shrines financed by the state, nearly 80,000 closed or merged with neighbors.^{: 98 : 118} Many shrines and shrine organizations began to independently embrace these state directives, regardless of funding.^: 114 By 1940, Shinto priests risked persecution for performing traditionally "religious" Shinto ceremonies.^{: 25 : 699} Imperial Japan did not draw a distinction between ideological Shinto and traditional Shinto.^: 100

US military leaders introduced the term "State Shinto" to differentiate the state's ideology from traditional Shinto practices^: 38 in the 1945 Shinto Directive.^: 38 That decree established Shinto as a religion, and banned further ideological uses of Shinto by the state.^: 703 Controversy continues to surround the use of Shinto symbols in state functions.^{: 428 : 706}